APA (American Psychological Association) style is most commonly used to cite sources within the social sciences. This resource, revised according to the 6th edition, second printing of the APA manual, offers examples for the general format of APA research papers, in-text citations, endnotes/footnotes, and the reference page. For more information, please consult the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, (6th ed., 2nd printing).

This resource covers American Sociological Association (ASA) style and includes information about manuscript formatting, in-text citations, formatting the references page, and accepted manuscript writing style. The bibliographical format described here is taken from the American Sociological Association (ASA) Style Guide, 5th edition.

Kate L. Turabian’s Manual for Writers of Research Papers, Theses, and Dissertations presents two basic documentation systems: notes-bibliography style (or simply bibliography style) and author-date style (sometimes called reference list style). These styles are essentially the same as those presented in The Chicago Manual of Style, sixteenth edition, with slight modifications for the needs of student writers.

MLA (Modern Language Association) style is most commonly used to write papers and cite sources within the liberal arts and humanities. This resource, updated to reflect the MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers (7th ed.) and the MLA Style Manual and Guide to Scholarly Publishing (3rd ed.), offers examples for the general format of MLA research papers, in-text citations, endnotes/footnotes, and the Works Cited page.

CITATION BASICS

There are certain basic things you need to cite just about any source, using just about any format:

The AUTHOR (or creator) of the work. This may be one person, many people, or a group or organization.

The TITLE OF THE WORK itself. For example, the article title, the book title, the chapter title, etc.

The JOURNAL or the PUBLISHER. For an article, you include the name of the specific magazine or journal. For a book, the publishing house.

The PUBLICATION DATE.

There are also certain things that must be included for specific types of works. For example, for an article or a book chapter, you would provide page numbers. For a website, you would provide the URL.

The moment when you are most likely to have easy access to all of this information? When you find it in the first place. Know then what you need to take note of to cite it effectively later.